Footage has surfaced of a young Black gymnast appearing to be missed during a medal ceremony in Ireland.<br /><br />The incident occurred at an event in Dublin in March 2022 and in the video, which has been viewed millions of times in recent days, a judge handed out participation awards to a line of children but ignored the Black child, appearing to speak to her before moving on without offering a medal.<br /><br />Four-time Olympic champion Simone Biles says the incident “broke my heart”.<br /><br />The child’s mother, speaking anonymously, has said she believes Gymnastics Ireland has failed to publicly apologise for the incident.<br /><br />The body has issued a statement saying they received a complaint alleging racist behaviour from the parents of the girl.<br /><br />“We are aware of a video that has been posted on social media relating to an incident that took place over 18 months ago at a GymSTART event in March 2022 for which we received a complaint from the parents of one of our members,” it read.<br /><br />“Subsequently both parties agreed to enter mediation which was independently facilitated by Sports Disputes Solutions Ireland as per our policy/procedure which led to a resolution agreed by both parties in August 2023.<br /><br />“The official in question accepted fully that what had happened had not been acceptable but stressed that it had not been intentional.”
